Project Management Skills Training – Managing Implementation part1

Managing projects is not easy, but it is a crucial task in the workplace. Our Project Management training course will present delegates with useful strategies that will assist them with:

  • organising projects
  • improving project management skills
  • managing projects effectively
  • project planning
  • becoming a great project manager

With ever-increasing workloads and deadlines, the ability to manage our time has never been more important. Project management is a crucial factor in work and our project management courses are created to ensure that delegates can make their work based projects as efficient and effective as possible. We do this by supplying a project management training course that is full of tools and tips for improving project planning, time planning, delegation, organisation and management strategies, managing meetings, as well as handling and using time effectively. Our Project Management Course will cover subjects such as goal setting, improving organisation skills and managing time successfully. Our seminars are packed with useful tips and techniques that allow you to become a better project manager instantly.

MANAGING IMPLEMENTATION

Let’s make it happen!

Once implementation is under way, monitor progress using the agreed measurement system, and maintain the support of key players and influential groups by regularly communicating with them.

Implementing a project may be quite lengthy because it may have to be phased, or it may take some time for sufficient data to be collected to confirm that the required improvements have been achieved. As a result, the project team should not be disbanded until:

  • Measurements confirm that you have a successful solution
  • The benefits are as planned, and meet the business needs
  • The project team has been given recognition, visibly, appropriately, and with a ‘personal touch’

MONITORING & CONTROLLING PROJECTS

After you’ve developed and planned your projects, you’ll next move into the Execution (or “delivery”) phase in the project life cycle. This is typically the longest phase in the project, as it’s in this phase that the physical deliverables are built for the project stakeholders/customer. How should you monitor and control your projects? It’s a good question, because everyone does it differently. It’s not enough to just plan your project; you need to ensure it runs on time, to budget and achieve its quality objectives. During the implementation phase of the project the successful project manager must be a combination of many things:

  • Coach
  • Optimist
  • Pessimist
  • Interrogator
  • Friend
  • Organiser
  • Influencer
  • Motivator
  • Communicator

Whatever the style of leadership adopted by the project manager he/she must monitor meticulously the component parts of the project and keep the lines of communication open so that everyone knows what’s happening; how events affect them and how their contribution affects others.

Ideally your project will have identified the associated risks, their impact and your strategy/contingency plan to deal with them. But a plan is only as good as the person managing it and if constant vigilance is not employed by the project manager in all phases of implementation then mistakes, delays and the unforeseen problems will affect the eventual outcome.

Monitoring and Controlling Your Projects

Whether your project is to build a construction complex, computer system or land a space vehicle on mars, you will need to very carefully monitor progress and control delivery. Otherwise, your project could go off the rails. So to monitor and control delivery, you need to implement critical project management monitoring by keeping control of:

  • Time Management
  • Cost Management
  • Quality Management

Time Management

Every Project Manager knows that the stakeholders expect their project to be delivered “on time”. But how many Project Managers actually record every hour spent by the project team on the project?

But to ensure on-time delivery, that’s what is sometimes needed and project managers need to implement a time management system into the project plan. This will help them to monitor the time spent by all of the members of the team, so that they can control how time is spent.

It’s not just about “having great time management skills” either, it’s about putting in place a process for recording time spent by staff by using timesheets and recording that time against the project plan.

That way, you can create an accurate picture of the current status of the project to determine whether or not it is likely to finish under/on/over the time allotted.

Mechanisms for managing time

  • Having a project plan that clearly outlines activities and time objectives
  • Referring to the Gantt chart or Project plan regularly
  • Ensure everyone communicates their progress consistently and honestly
  • Using a computerised monitoring software such as Outlook, Microsoft Project or similar
  • Directing the team’s and individual’s actions
  • Communicating to the team members what, how, when and who’s doing what
  • Establishing time lines and following through on promises for delivery
  • Directing and controlling when appropriate
  • Providing immediate, constructive feedback on all aspects of the project
  • Being unafraid to take corrective action when the project deviates from its time objectives

Cost Management

Few Project Managers can tell you for every day of the project, exactly how much of their budget they have spent to date. The reason is that many of the project costs are often difficult to track, especially when they relate to the use of equipment and consumption of materials.

But to deliver your project within budget, you need to monitor and control all of the costs that accrue, on a very regular basis. You can do this by implementing a cost management process.

Cost Management is all about accurately recording project expenses, as they occur. By using project management forms – Expense Forms and an Expense Register, you can monitor all project costs and control expenditure when unplanned expenses arise. You don’t need to be an accountant, you just need to keep an eye on the overall project expenditure on a weekly basis and act quickly when any issues arise.

Mechanisms for managing costs

  • Having a project plan that clearly incorporates budget requirements broken down by activity
  • Making sure everyone has some form of budgetary responsibility
  • Ensure everyone communicates their progress consistently and honestly
  • Using a system that identifies agreed significant deviations from the project plan
  • Communicating to all when tight budgetary management is necessary
  • Directing and controlling when appropriate
  • Ensuring there are tight budgetary controls e.g. expense forms, expense register
  • Being unafraid to take corrective action when the project deviates from its time objectives

Project Management Skills Training

The course is designed to help delegates organise their workload while planning a project. This is done with the aid of Gantt charts and project management templates, tools and techniques. This course is also a great option if you seek project management for junior staff in the workplace as it will informatively aid staff in planning successful projects.

There are many benefits of being a project manager such as; better task management; increased self esteem; the ability to negotiate more effectively and reduce the stress which results from a lack of effective planning.